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“I’m not stirring the shit,” Caddy said, “but I would like to know just a little bit more about our father. What did he look like? What did he say? Is he as crazy as folks say?”
“I’d back away from this situation like a burning car,” Qui
“You calling him Jason?”
“I’m not calling him Dad.”
“He had to have a good reason,” Caddy said. “If he didn’t have a good one, he would have made one up.”
“He tried,” Qui
“And you charged him with murder.”
“I charged him as an accessory,” Qui
Caddy took in a long breath. Little Jason was inside watching television, a show on PBS about a couple brothers who fight crime against wild animals called Wild Kratts. Jason liked animals and thought of himself as an animal protector and rescuer.
“I want to talk to him,” Caddy said.
“No you don’t.”
“Not your decision,” Caddy said. “Sorry.”
“That’s like sticking your head in an oven,” Qui
“I want to know his reasons.”
“Who gives a shit?”
“I give a shit, Qui
“We had bigger issues.”
Caddy was silent, not wanting to address that time in the woods, that man following them both, and what had happened in that old and rotten barn. Maybe Jason had loved them once, but he was a man who loved himself so much that he did everything he could to destroy himself. Qui
“Did he try to talk to you?” Caddy asked.
“Yep.”
“Did he try and explain things?” Caddy said. “With him and Momma? And him not coming back ever?”
“Yep.”
“Did it make sense?”
“He finally quit talking to me,” Qui
They rocked some more. A nice warm breeze passed over them, the bright, fun sounds of the television show coming through the open door, Jason giggling inside.
“This is your house.”
“You,” Caddy said, “get married. Bring her here. Have a family. Don’t be frozen. Move on. You’re not that type of man. Move on to the next thing, the next story. Grow. Life does not stop.”
“Preacher?”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“I have no problem with a woman being a preacher,” Qui
Qui
“What?” Caddy said.
“Somebody must’ve drove off from the pump without paying,” Qui
“Is he as bad as you think?”
“Worse.”
“Stay here,” Caddy said. “Don’t mess up supper. Let Lillie handle things.”
“It’s my job,” Qui
“She’s pretty tough,” Caddy said. “Toughest woman I ever met.”
“I have no doubt,” Qui
All of the Tibbehah County Sheriff’s Department came out to see the homicide. All seven of them.
Lillie borrowed a stepladder from the Rebel Truck Stop to shoot photos of Stillwell’s body, not that she had a hard time getting near the corpse. She and Ke
Qui
“Oh, yes, sir,” Stagg said. “Only one issue with that.”
Qui
“That’s one place we don’t keep a camera,” Stagg said. “Don’t have a lot of folks stealing garbage. Mainly, people just tossing their shit in there without permission. Hardly worth the cost.”
Qui
“Or a motorcycle,” Stagg said.
“Even if it’s who you think it is,” Qui
“You’d be amazed at the braze
“She does.”
“You sure admire that woman,” Stagg said, wiping his brow with a paper napkin, “don’t you? Shame she don’t go for your type.”
“We been over this ground before,” Qui
“You don’t know?” Stagg said. “Thought y’all had been real chatty.”
“That the reason LeDoux would have him killed?”
Stagg opened his mouth, then shut it in a false, toothy grin and didn’t say a word.
Qui
“Two tough gals,” Stagg said.
“Pretty clear what killed him.”
“Two in the head,” Stagg said. “I seen it. LeDoux making a goddamn statement.”
“Since you seem to know,” Qui
“On why LeDoux killed him and deposited his dead ass on my property?”
“That’d be the question.”
“Shit,” Stagg said. “Stillwell told me himself that he was the boy who put LeDoux in prison. He was the goddamn informant for the Feds and somehow LeDoux knew about it.”